Frances Fitzgerald (Fine Gael)

I welcome the opportunity to debate this issue. I also welcome the Minster of State, as he played a key role in the committee's work in the past few months. It has been an extraordinary experience to be a member of the committee. I pay tribute to the Chairman, Deputy Mary O'Rourke, because, as Senator Alex White said, it was complex gathering together all of the work that had been done previously, examining the Constitution, considering how it should be amended, which is such a significant move, examining the balance that needed to be maintained and working out final recommendations regarding the various articles. Deputy O'Rourke presided over the committee with great patience and tenacity and ensured we arrived at a point where we could publish with all-party agreement, on which I compliment her and the members of the committee. The members with legal experience played a unique role, particularly Deputy Shatter and Senator Alex White. We also had a superb legal team. Self-praise is no praise but to arrive a point where we had consensus among all the political parties on such an issue was important.

The Minister of State and the Government have a unique opportunity to implement the report and put the matter to the people in a referendum, assuming the seismic changes in politics of the past few weeks do not continue. If the Minister of State has the opportunity, he should grasp it with both hands. He has been given an unique opportunity to bring forward watershed legislation and a watershed referendum on children's rights. I know he wants to do this and hope he will not be stymied by the Attorney General and that he will get the support he should receive. So much time and work has gone into this that the goodwill and good intentions of the committee in the final set of recommendations must be accepted. The public will accept that the committee sought to strike the correct balance between protecting the family and protecting the rights of children. Proportionality is an important term in the recommendations and the proposed amendment to the Constitution. The recommendations at which we have arrived grasp that balance well and elegantly and in a way that is protective of the family and children. That is what the people want. They do not want the family unit to be undermined; they want children's rights to be recognised in order that children will not be neglected in the way they have been for such a long period.

If one considers the history of children's rights in Ireland over a long period, the Murphy and Ryan reports contained strong evidence that children's rights were not central. This also was evident with the Child Care Act, when it took 100 years to replace an old English Act with the new children's legislation that was introduced in the 1990s.

It is extremely important to consider the highly positive response of groups and individuals to this report and I believe one should not go into a referendum campaign assuming there will be a high degree of conflict because there is absolutely no need for it. This measure has all-party support and as Senator Alex White noted, there has been an extremely positive response from those experts in the area who have examined it in detail. Moreover, all the existing children's rights organisations have expressed their support for the work that has been done. Indeed, as Senator White observed, such organisations have heavily influenced this work by repeatedly appearing before the joint committee to amend work that had been done. This places the Government in a unique position to bring forward children's rights, to change the Constitution and to ensure the balances are better than has been the case over a long time. The Minister of State's contribution referred to Mrs. Justice Catherine McGuinness and the Kilkenny incest report, which was when consciousness was heightened in respect of children's rights, the failure of the Constitution to protect them and the plight of children in incestuous situations. Other children were in care or had parents who were alive but were not in contact with them. While they were being brought up in institutions, they could be adopted by a loving family were the Constitution different.

I perceive this report to be hugely supportive of the family. While there have been a few comments to the effect that it could lead to inappropriate interventions in families, I do not believe this to be the case. I noted an example being given on television recently that the State will seek to interfere in cases involving obese children. I thought this diminished the work put into the report regarding the balances that were carefully arrived at and demonstrated a simplistic attitude to the highly complex work the joint committee was trying to carry out. Were this referendum to be passed, judges who came to interpret these proposals would be obliged to weigh up a careful balance between what happens to the individual child and to the family. Furthermore, there is no question of snatching children from families. The recommendations are written in too nuanced and careful a manner for this to be the outcome. From a public perspective, the Murphy and Ryan reports, as well as the kind of information that has entered public consciousness over the past year or two in particular, have heightened people's awareness and levels of information about what has happened to children.

I ask the Government to make a rapid decision in this regard. It has both all-party support and that of all the organisations with respect to the report's contents. However, a strong informational campaign for the public will be needed in order that they understand the recommendations and I ask the Minister of State to examine this proposal. One should recall what happened in respect of the Lisbon treaty referendum, when people did not understand, became confused or thought it proposed one thing rather than another. Members will recall the efforts they were obliged to make to provide detailed explanations and to clear up any misunderstandings and consequently should ensure there will be no misunderstandings about these proposals or that there will be no glib comments about it destroying families. Instead, Members should communicate to the public what it actually proposes, which is that for the first time, the Constitution will expressly acknowledge a child's individual rights. In addition, it will recognise the central role of parents in the development of a child but will note the State must intervene when children are truly at risk. Equally however, it will ensure that such interventions must be proportionate and effective and will hold out the possibility of adoption for the approximately 2,000 children who are in long-term care at present and who have no realistic chance of being brought up by one or both of their birth parents. In the course of two years of hearings, there have been 62 meetings and the joint committee has received huge input to arrive at this position. I wish the Minister of State well when he takes this report to the Government and I hope he will receive strong support. I am confident he will and that he will continue to receive the all-party support that emerged at the joint committee.